NPL's commercial services are built on 100 years of leadership in accuracy, innovation and scientific research. Experienced consultants and project managers draw upon a unique combination of industry know-how and world-leading scientific discovery to deliver real-world business solutions and enable innovation and secure competitive advantage.

We strive to actively promote public awareness and appreciation of science and technology, particularly the importance of measurement and the role of NPL. Here you can find out more about the interesting things we do, science outreach activities you can get involved in or take a look at some of our educational resources.

Siberian crystals for science and life

Siberian scientists have a long and illustrious history of growing crystals for lasers and optics. Prof Andreev will recount tales of crystal growth and will proffer multifarious examples of applications, from LIDAR to bamboo laser frequency conversion, to resistivity standards.

With more than 40 years' experience, Prof Yuri M Andreev is an expert in the design and development of MIR to Far IR lasers, parametric frequency converters and LIDAR systems. The author of 450+ papers in the fields of optics, nonlinear optics and crystal growth, he and his team have been at the forefront of the development of many now familiar crystal technologies such as ZnGeP2. A visiting professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Yuri was recently awarded their gold medal in recognition of his work as a leading foreign scientist.

Formerly of the Institute of Atmospheric Optics and now Chief Scientist with the Institute of Monitoring of Climatic and Ecological Systems SB RAS (IMCES SB RAS) Tomsk Russia, Prof Andreev and his group are working with NPL to develop new broadly tunable Terahertz sources.